Rock Band Network, the do-it-yourself authoring service that allows bands to put their own music into Rock Band, has always been available on XBox 360. From time to time, Harmonix will send the most popular songs over to PSN and Wii. Now the developer has announced that Wii version of Rock Band Network will be shut down this week.

In the weekly DLC announcement, Harmonix’s Aaron Trites explains,

With the smaller online install base, limited demand for releases so far and the significant amount of work it takes for our producers and audio team to convert and process these additional tracks, we’re no longer able to continue submitting RBN content to the Wii.

This won’t affect regular weekly DLC, as the announcement continues, “regular Wii DLC, and RBN releases for the 360 and PS3 will continue uninterrupted.”

Here’s the list of songs Wii owners can expect to see this week before RBN shuts down on their platform.

]]>http://www.gamefront.com/rock-band-network-going-dark-on-wii-this-week/feed/0GameFront 2010: Year in Random Statshttp://www.gamefront.com/gamefront-2010-the-year-in-random-stats/
http://www.gamefront.com/gamefront-2010-the-year-in-random-stats/#commentsTue, 07 Dec 2010 03:05:40 +0000Phil Hornshawhttp://www.gamefront.com/?p=76198What did we learn from 2010? For one, we're not allowed to have nice things: see the breakdown of everything we broke and repaired this year. Plus, the GameFront Staff Zombie Kill Count.

Looking over the pile of games we’ve gone through during 2010 at GameFront, we started to wonder. How many games did we review this year? How many had we painstakingly created walkthroughs for? How many zombies did we massacre in the course of hacking our way through Fortune City in Dead Rising 2, and how many times were we brutalized by angry high-voiced anonymous children on Xbox Live in Call of Duty: Black Ops?

So we started crunching the numbers. For your enjoyment and with absolutely no useful application whatsoever, here’s our 2010 by the numbers.

Site-wide:

Everything we wrote down and slapped on the Internet to be met by your eyeballs, by category.

Reviews: 85

Walkthroughs: 50

News posts: 2,124

Cheats posts: 303

Features: 390

Videos: 268

Stats by Writer:

Once we got bored of looking at the different kinds of posts we did, we started slogging through our Gamer Cards, PSN IDs, Steam accounts, electricity bills, game shelves and piles of non-working Xboxes to figure out what 2010 looked like for each of us.

Phil Owen inaugurated a new Xbox 360 S this year after a disc drive failure claimed his last box after the warranty had expired. That would make it his 12th 360 — and the system just celebrated its fifth birthday last month.

He also warmed his thumbs with 66 new disc-based games he’d never played before.

Ron Whitakerlost his PS3 to the Yellow Light of Death, at the inopportune time of having Uncharted 2 stuck in the disc tray. He bought a second PS3 as a pinch hitter while the first one was being worked on at Sony.

He purchased 24 games he didn’t need for any reason this year, just because they were on sale on Steam.

Ron also found time to slay some 15,573 Left 4 Dead 2 zombies, the vast majority with the Magnum Pistol. This count was down, however, from 2009′s 24,417 killed.

And finally, Ron managed to log 12 full months without renewing his subscription to World of Warcraft.

Ben Richardson’s Xbox 360 suffered some kind of disc drive indigestion when the bar code label on a Blockbuster disc peeled off mid-game. Chalk up one more repair.

During his 2010 tour, Ben racked up 258 disintegrations as he trekked the desolate fields of the Wasteland in Fallout: New Vegas. Back in Dead Rising 2‘s livelier Fortune City, he put down 2,129 zombies for the year. And in his service, more than 100,000 soldiers (a quarter of the U.S. losses in World War II) were KIA in Total War.

Ben’s game shelves swelled by 19 new games this year, and he managed to play two old ones for good measure.

He also put in 47 hours in Fallout: New Vegas, 67 hours in Empire: Total War and 49 hours in Napoleon: Total War.

Phil Hornshaw’s Xbox 360 Elite graced the worktable of a Microsoft repair technician twice during 2010, and twice the machine’s guts were splayed out on Hornshaw’s own coffee table as he attempted to fix it himself (the warranty having expired). Only one of those repair sessions was successful — those YouTube videos that suggest fixing an E74 error with pennies are incorrect. FYI.

Hornshaw murdered something in the range of 11,651 zombies in Dead Rising 2 during 2010, although the exact figure is sketchy due to files being saved over multiple times. He also suffered some 4,482 multiplayer deaths on Xbox Live during that time.

Of the 22 games he played, he turned out 16 walkthroughs for GameFront. He spent 99 hours, 4 minutes and 8 seconds playing Red Dead Redemption (not including any of the DLC), at least a portion of that for the walkthrough. Meanwhile, Kane & Lynch 2 presented the quickest walkthrough and was handled in one marathon overnight session.

Hornshaw snagged 404 Achievements and Trophies this year, and also created his own environmental holocaust by logging some 3,386 kilowatt-hours of power while working from home.

Just like the other Phil, Hornshaw also broke his computer — twice. And after HP fixed it, he broke it again, and had to fix it himself.

Shawn Sines managed not to have any hardware fail on him, putting him squarely in the magic 58 percent of Xbox 360s that don’t fail and 81 percent of Playstation 3′s that don’t fail (according to some fairly unofficial figures discovered in a cursory Google search). He also received 90 percent of hateful glares as he told us he hadn’t any hardware failures.

Shawn continued his proud tradition of (inadvertently? He refused to clarify…) purchasing the same game more than once. The top offender was Dragon Age: Origins — he bought the game twice, then bought DLC for both copies — twice.

Mark Burnham didn’t just have a PC break this year — he had one grievously wounded by a malware attack. Despite his best efforts of squashing the offending program, no mere mortal anti-virus measure was enough to combat it. In fact, as Mark tells it, it took all the abilities of his local PC repair ninja, who was nearly lost in the process and was left exhausted. One evil little bug nearly cost Mark a computer, as well as a ninja his life.

When everything finally was healed, however, Mark managed to fire through 21 new games this year.

Approximate Totals:

New games played: 148

Xbox repairs: 4

Replacement Xbox 360′s purchased: 1

PS3 repairs: 1

Replacement PS3′s purchased: 1

PC repairs: 5

Zombies massacred: 29,353 (with three writers reporting)

Got goofy random stats of your own? Leave ‘em in the comments.

Want to add to your “Zombies Killed” total by plowing through the Case West DLC? We’ve got a full walkthrough here.

]]>http://www.gamefront.com/gamefront-2010-the-year-in-random-stats/feed/0New Rock Band 3 DLC Not Compatible With Rock Band 1 and 2http://www.gamefront.com/new-rock-band-3-dlc-not-compatible-with-rock-band-1-and-2/
http://www.gamefront.com/new-rock-band-3-dlc-not-compatible-with-rock-band-1-and-2/#commentsWed, 10 Nov 2010 16:37:00 +0000Ron Whitakerhttp://news.filefront.com/?p=64406DLC is one of the pillars of Rock Band's offering. Unfortunately, new DLC won't work for those who don't own the newest title.

Rock Band is in the wild, and the first waves of downloadable songs are already available. If you haven’t picked up Harmonix’s third installment in the series yet, you probably shouldn’t run out and grab the new DLC for your copy of Rock Band.

Harmonix has told Joystiq that “due to the new authoring standards, inclusion of new instruments, new lighting / venue cues, etc.” the new Rock Band 3 DLC won’t be compatible with previous editions of the game.

On the plus side, Harmonix is making it difficult to buy songs that are not compatible. Songs for Rock Band 3 won’t appear in the in-game music stores for Rock Band 1 and 2. They also won’t show up on the standalone music store or in the console marketplaces.

I don’t think this is a big deal, especially since Rock Band 3 is such a huge step forward from the previous titles. At least you can still import your songs from previous Rock Band titles, and your old DLC still works, right?

]]>http://www.gamefront.com/new-rock-band-3-dlc-not-compatible-with-rock-band-1-and-2/feed/1Harmonix to Reach Rock Band Milestone Next Weekhttp://www.gamefront.com/harmonix-to-reach-rock-band-milestone-next-week/
http://www.gamefront.com/harmonix-to-reach-rock-band-milestone-next-week/#commentsTue, 05 Oct 2010 14:07:44 +0000Ron Whitakerhttp://news.filefront.com/?p=58354Rock Band creators Harmonix are about to reach a huge milestone on the DLC front next week with the release of "Are You Experienced" by Jimi Hendrix.

Ever since Harmonix broke away from Activision and created Rock Band, they’ve been working on making DLC a major part of their offering. Every week, Rock Band has new songs available on both PlayStation Network and XBox Live, and now they’re even letting bands create their own songs for Rock Band using Rock Band Network.

All of this creates a great environment for gamers, since there are literally hundreds of songs to choose from, covering all genres of music.

Next week, on Tuesday, October 12, Harmonix will hit a major milestone in DLC, when they offer up the 2000th song for Rock Band (not including the songs on The Beatles: Rock Band). Fittingly, the 2000th song will be Jimi Hendrix’s “Are You Experienced?” No doubt, Harmonix is.

A tip of the hat to the folks at Harmonix, and a question: How in the world are you spending all of the money I give you for DLC?

]]>http://www.gamefront.com/harmonix-to-reach-rock-band-milestone-next-week/feed/0Rock Band Getting More Disturbedhttp://www.gamefront.com/rock-band-getting-more-disturbed/
http://www.gamefront.com/rock-band-getting-more-disturbed/#commentsFri, 20 Aug 2010 15:07:28 +0000Ron Whitakerhttp://news.filefront.com/?p=53127Harmonix is rolling new Rock Band tracks for next week, and half of them are straight off the upcoming Disturbed album.

Next week’s new Rock Band DLC will make Disturbed fans and American Idol watchers happy.

First up, there are three new tracks from Disturbed, all from their upcoming album, Asylum. The new album is due out on August 31, but you can be playing these tracks next Tuesday, August 24th. If you’re thinking about picking up the new album, you should note that you’ll get a copy of the Decade of Disturbed documentary with every copy of the new album.

The other three songs are from three new bands: We Are The Fallen (made up of former Evanescence members and American Idol finalist Carly Smithson), Crash Kings, and The Veer Union. Here’s the list of songs for next week:Disturbed Pack 03

Disturbed – “Another Way to Die”

Disturbed – “Asylum”

Disturbed – “The Animal”

Universal Motown Republic Rock Pack 01

Crash Kings – “Mountain Man”

The Veer Union – “Seasons”

We Are the Fallen – “Bury Me Alive”

The new tracks will be available next Tuesday, August 24th on XBox Live and PlayStation Network. Pricing is as you’d expect, $1.99 (160 MS POINTS)per song, $2.00 (200 WII POINTS) per song, or $5.49 (440 MS POINTS) for either track pack.

]]>The Decemberists, dc Talk, Eagles of Death Metal, Blondie – the new Rock Band 2 downloadable track pack available on Tuesday certainly has variety.

Harmonix announced that its new downloadable content pack will features songs from a bunch of artists instead of several tracks from just one, and that most of the bands have never had tracks on Rock Band before. Only Blondie, KMFDM and Family Force 5 have other tracks in the game.

Here’s the track list:

Blondie – “Rapture”

dc Talk – “Jesus Freak”

The Decemberists – “The Perfect Crime # 2”

Eagles of Death Metal – “I Only Want You”

Eels – “Saturday Morning”

Family Force 5 – “Love Addict”

KMFDM – “Sturm & Drang”

La Roux – “Bulletproof”

The songs go for 160 Microsoft Points each on Xbox Live, 200 points on the Wii Virtual Console, or about $1.99 on the Playstation Network.

According to Harmonix, the new pack knocks the total number of Rock Band tracks on disc and online up to 1,568. If you bought all of them one by one as DLC, it would cost you $3,120.32; 250,880 Microsoft Points; or 313,600 Wii Points.

The size of Rock Band’s DLC catalog has officially reached staggering. According to the Rock Band music page, you can now choose from 1,662 songs to feed your Rock Band addiction. Each week, they keep adding more, and next week is no exception.

One of the bands that has very underrepresented in Rock Band is Creedence Clearwater Revival. To date, the only song available was a cover of Fortunate Son, added way back in early 2008. It was a really good cover, but I know of at least a few fans who wanted more. Luckily, their wait ends Tuesday.

The first Creedence pack hits Live and PlayStation Network on July 6 (European PSN on July 7), and contain 12 songs from the band who sold 26 million albums in the US. Check out the full list of songs just after the break, and plan on starting those downloads Tuesday.

All the tracks listed below are original master recordings, and will be available for $1.99 (160 MS Points, 200 Wii Points) each, or $19.99 (1600 MS Points) for the lot. Additionally, all of these songs except “Run Through the Jungle” will be available on the LEGO Rock Band Store as well.

]]>http://www.gamefront.com/rock-band-gets-creedence-clearwater-revival/feed/0Rock Band Getting Pantera DLC Next Weekhttp://www.gamefront.com/rock-band-getting-pantera-dlc-next-week/
http://www.gamefront.com/rock-band-getting-pantera-dlc-next-week/#commentsFri, 21 May 2010 17:13:10 +0000Ron Whitakerhttp://news.filefront.com/?p=38533If you’ve been waiting for more metal in your Rock Band like I have, next week’s offerings are bound to...

]]>If you’ve been waiting for more metal in your Rock Band like I have, next week’s offerings are bound to bring a smile to your face.

Tuesdays, May 25, will bring Pantera’s 1996 album, The Great Southern Trendkill, to the Rock Band Store. Whether you want to emulate the blazing guitar riffs of ‘Dimebag’ Darrell, or the screeching vocals of Phil Anselmo, you’ll be able to do so for the standard Rock Band rates.

In case you don’t know what those are, it’s $1.99 (160 MS Points, 200 Wii Points) per song, or $15.99 for the whole album. We’ve got the entire track list for the Rock Band release after the break.

]]>http://www.gamefront.com/rock-band-getting-pantera-dlc-next-week/feed/0Green Day and Rockstar Mayhem Headed for Rock Bandhttp://www.gamefront.com/green-day-and-rockstar-mayhem-headed-for-rock-band/
http://www.gamefront.com/green-day-and-rockstar-mayhem-headed-for-rock-band/#commentsThu, 02 Jul 2009 20:16:28 +0000Evahttp://news.filefront.com/?p=32129Tracks from Green Day’s 21st Century Breakdown release will be coming to the Rock Band and Rock Band 2 Wii...

Tracks from Green Day’s 21st Century Breakdown release will be coming to the Rock Band and Rock Band 2 Wii catalog. These three new tracks are a stark contrast with 8 choice original masters from artists participating in the RockStar Energy Drink Mayhem Festival. Behemoth, Cannibal Corpse, Marilyn Manson and Slayer are all on the list.

Tracks:

Green Day “21 Guns”

Green Day “East Jesus Nowhere”

Green Day “Know Your Enemy”

Behemoth “Conquer All”

Black Dahlia Murder “What a Horrible Night to Have a Curse”

Cannibal Corpse “Hammer Smashed Face”

God Forbid “Empire of the Gun”

Job for a Cowboy “Embedded”

Marilyn Manson “Disposable Teens”

Slayer “Black Magic”

Whitechapel “This Is Exile”

(All tracks are original master recordings)

Tracks from festival artists Killswitch Engine and Bullet For My Valentine are already part of the extensive Rock Band DLC catalog. All these selections will be up for the PS3, Xbox 360 and the Wii the week of July 6th.

]]>http://www.gamefront.com/green-day-and-rockstar-mayhem-headed-for-rock-band/feed/0NIN, Dead Kennedys, Weezer Headed for Rock Band DLChttp://www.gamefront.com/nin-dead-kennedys-weezer-headed-for-rock-band-dlc/
http://www.gamefront.com/nin-dead-kennedys-weezer-headed-for-rock-band-dlc/#commentsTue, 23 Jun 2009 01:18:32 +0000Evahttp://news.filefront.com/?p=31828This week, Rock Band fans that play on the Wii can look forward to more tracks from Nine Inch Nails,...

]]>This week, Rock Band fans that play on the Wii can look forward to more tracks from Nine Inch Nails, the Dead Kennedys and Weezer. Dashboard Confessional, Free, The Cab and Scars on Broadway each have an original master track in the line up as well Testament and Staind.

The Rock Band DLC catalog swells to over 330 tracks for download with these releases. Although it still has along way to go to catch the robust offerings for Rock Band and Rock Band 2 on the Xbox 360 and PS3, it’s almost half way there.

It’s disappointing that there’s still no price cut available in the form of track packs. The Wii DLC is set up for individual downloads at $2.00 or 200 Wii points each with the exception of Thenewno2 “Yomp” which you can pick up for $1.00.
Here’s the full list of original master recordings coming out Tuesday June 23rd for the Wii:

]]>http://www.gamefront.com/nin-dead-kennedys-weezer-headed-for-rock-band-dlc/feed/1Rockin’ Out with Your Twang Out – Rock Band Country Tracks Revealedhttp://www.gamefront.com/rockin-out-with-your-twang-out-rock-band-country-tracks-revealed/
http://www.gamefront.com/rockin-out-with-your-twang-out-rock-band-country-tracks-revealed/#commentsTue, 16 Jun 2009 00:26:42 +0000Shawn Sineshttp://news.filefront.com/?p=31578Not every hardcore Rock Band junkie is a metal and alt rock junkie it seems, so Harmonix is releasing more...

]]>Not every hardcore Rock Band junkie is a metal and alt rock junkie it seems, so Harmonix is releasing more country oriented tracks for fans of the steel guitar and southern drawl. The new Rock Band Country Pack adds to the existing songs from the genre, 21 new songs in fact. The retail disk is compatible with both Rock Band titles and the new tracks will be exclusive to the disk for a short time before making their way onto the Rock Band stores on the Wii, 360 and PS3.

Here is the complete Track list:

1.

Alan Jackson

Good Time*

2.

Brad Paisley

Mud on the Tires

3.

Brooks & Dunn

Hillbilly Deluxe

4.

Cross Canadian Ragweed

Cry Lonely*

5.

Dierks Bentley

Free and Easy (Down the Road I Go)

6.

Dixie Chicks

Sin Wagon

7.

Drive-By Truckers

3 Dimes Down

8.

Jason Aldean

She’s Country*

9.

Keith Urban

I Told You So*

10.

Kenny Chesney

She Thinks My Tractor’s Sexy*

11.

Kenny Rogers

The Gambler*

12.

Lucinda Williams

Can’t Let Go

13.

Martina McBride

This One’s For The Girls*

14.

Miranda Lambert

Gunpowder & Lead

15.

Montgomery Gentry

Gone*

16.

Rascal Flatts

Me and My Gang*

17.

Sara Evans

Suds In The Bucket*

18.

Shania Twain

Any Man of Mine*

19.

Steve Earle

Satellite Radio

20.

Trace Adkins

Swing*

21.

Willie Nelson

On the Road Again*

* Denotes track new to Rock Band platform

PS3 and 360 version owners can copy the tracks to their hard drives for integration into either titles mix of songs or play directly from the disk (if you maybe want to keep the country out of your rock sessions and randomly generated set lists).

]]>http://www.gamefront.com/rockin-out-with-your-twang-out-rock-band-country-tracks-revealed/feed/0BringIt: Competitive Gamers to Clash for Cashhttp://www.gamefront.com/bringit-competitive-gamers-to-clash-for-cash/
http://www.gamefront.com/bringit-competitive-gamers-to-clash-for-cash/#commentsFri, 21 Nov 2008 20:46:44 +0000Shawn Sineshttp://news.filefront.com/?p=28785BringIt is setting up a service with a secure site where gamers can compete for cash online 24/7. Any game...

BringIt is setting up a service with a secure site where gamers can compete for cash online 24/7. Any game platform with Internet connectivity can get in on the action.

“BringIt is going to transform the videogame landscape by allowing individuals to compete online for bragging rights and real money through skill-based gaming,” said BringIt CEO and founder Woody Levin. “Gamers have shown great interest and support for competitive gaming, so we are pleased to offer BringIt as a player-driven service that quickly connects gamers, allowing them to play legally for cash while getting a more intense competitive rush.”

I should think that mixing videogames and betting will seriously up the danger factor for gamers with addictive personalities. It should also make BringIt a lot of money.

BringIt makes competitive console gaming easy, adding only one step to secure online game play. Registration is free and available to gamers 18 years and older. Players can fund their BringIt account via PayPal or major credit card and access their secure account at their convenience. As a special welcome, BringIt will match initial deposits up to $20 for those individuals who register and use the service during the open beta period. Accounts are limited to one per person, insuring player identities are verified.

Players can ‘BringIt’ for as little as $1 or up to as much as $100,000, so both casual players and those who crave the adrenaline of high stakes can engage at their own pace and be assured their BringIt
challenge experience is safe and secure. During gameplay, the collective entry fees are held in an escrow account until the winner is declared and verified, at which point the funds are released to the
winner’s secure account, minus the BringIt service fee. BringIt provides neutral arbitration as well as a self-regulating player feedback system that lets members know an opponent’s standing in advance of initiating a challenge or accepting a match.

Undoubtedly the highlight of this week’s PlayStation Store update (which, once again, ignores PSP owners altogether) is the release of the long-awaited BioShock challenge rooms, as promised earlier. For $10, you’ll be able to work your way through three separate scenarios: Rescuing a Little Sister from a carnival, killing a Big Daddy without any weapons, and tackling a series of rooms containing wave after wave of enemies.

Also new this week is downloadable content for Dead Space (various skin packs and weapon packs, ranging from $1-$4) and new costumes for Little Big Planet (a free Sack in the Box costume and a $3 LocoRoco pack which has five different costumes). Rock Band and Guitar Hero World Tour square off, with GH adding three tracks from The Raconteurs ($2 each of $5.49 for a bundle of all three), while Rock Band 1 and Rock Band 2 get three songs from Mission of Burma and three from the Dead Kennedys (both artists’ music costs $2 each or $5.49 for a bundle of all three songs). There are also four other songs from Crooked X ($1), Lacuna Coil ($2 each), and In This Moment ($2), which you can get in a bundle for $5.49. Karaoke Revolution Presents: American Idol Encore 2 also gets five new songs, each for just $1.49.

Aside from that, there’s a demo of MotoGP ’08 (which you can check out on PC at FileFront) as well as some videos, trailers, and themes of everything from NBA 2K9 to Hancock.

Sorry, PSP owners. I wasn’t teasing you — there really is nothing for you this week.

]]>http://www.gamefront.com/new-bioshock-challenges-finally-available-on-ps3/feed/0Rock Band 2 Registration for 20 Free Songs Now Openhttp://www.gamefront.com/rock-band-2-registration-for-20-free-songs-now-open/
http://www.gamefront.com/rock-band-2-registration-for-20-free-songs-now-open/#commentsWed, 01 Oct 2008 15:49:46 +0000Jonathanhttp://news.filefront.com/?p=28259If you picked up Rock Band 2, you may have noticed a code on the back of your manual with...

If you picked up Rock Band 2, you may have noticed a code on the back of your manual with instructions on how to get 20 bonus songs for free. Well now it seems Harmonix has opened the way for you to be one step closer to getting those free tracks. Registration has now opened so that you can enter your code a receive an e-mail with another code once the tracks become available. Sadly, those extra tracks are still a “few weeks” away from being released, and we still have no idea what they might be. Finger crossed for Journey!

Interestingly enough only one of the winning games, Madden NFL 09 will make it to the Nintendo Wii or the DS. Far be it from me to suggest that it could have anything to do with Nintendo CEO Satoru Iwata’s declaration that E3 is no longer the appropriate venue for core games.